


Emanations (Alternate)

by ApostropheN



Series: Cavit Ro Voyager Alternate Retelling [7]
Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Episode: s01e09 Emanations, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 10:40:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29899845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApostropheN/pseuds/ApostropheN
Summary: Continuing the retelling of Captain Cavit and Commander Ro on USS Voyager. Investigating subspace vacuoles around a ringed planet, Voyager finds itself accidentally making first contact with a new species.Note: the "Major Character Death" warning applies to the original Starfleet crew from Canon Voyager (Janeway, Paris, Kim) having not survived the trip to the Alpha Quadrant, whereas instead Cavit, Stadi, Fitzgerald and Honigsberg survived.
Series: Cavit Ro Voyager Alternate Retelling [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2137725





	Emanations (Alternate)

Zandra Taitt thought of her morning tour of Deck Five as her “lab walk.” As much a way to touch base as to focus her mind on the various activities of her staff, the routine comforted her with structure and meant she saw the vast majority of her science officers on a regular basis. Some days, she would even spend most of her day in one of the labs herself, but most of the time she was on the bridge at the science station, organizing, referencing, and directing.

The Physical Sciences Lab was her first stop on the arc of Voyager’s fifth deck. 

“Good morning,” she said, passing through the door.

“Good morning, Lieutenant,” Crewman Celes said from the centre station, where she was working alongside Crewman Li-Paz from engineering and Crewman Copage. They were the only three still in the lab, and had likely been there throughout the night shift working.

“How are we doing?” Taitt asked.

“We’re on track.” Elliot Copage took the lead, as he often did. He tapped the display, bringing up a series of compounds on the master display. Copage, a grey haired man with deep brown skin, was someone Taitt had come to treasure his decades of service over the near two months since they’d arrived in the Delta Quadrant. Calm, patient, and methodical, he tended to ground the people he worked with—something she really appreciated when he worked with Celes especially, who had a tendency to lose her focus. “We’ve analyzed the compounds, and it looks like some of them should be suitable.”

“Fantastic,” Taitt said. “When you’ve got everything logged, send it to my station, would you?”

“Will do, Lieutenant.”

“Good job,” she said, meaning it. They’d topped up their power reserves during their time with the Numiri, but she was making it her personal mission to stay one step ahead of their next shortage, keeping a constant eye out for anything in Voyager’s path that might supplement their reserves.

She resisted the urge to remind Celes to double-check her results—Copage was there, he’d remind her—nodded to the three, and left them to it.

*

Planetary sciences was dark, but the lights were on in Life Sciences. She still felt a tiny frisson of discomfort every time she came stepped into the space—when the EPS conduits had failed all across the deck during their arrival in the Delta Quadrant she’d lost the entire life sciences staff as aresult. Taitt couldn’t decide if she wanted that feeling to pass, or if it was right for it to remain in some small way.

Today, Ensign Bronowski and two of the Ocampa, Cir and Gara, were present. The three were gathered around one of the two-tier stacked plant containers from hydroponics. Fresh green shoots sprouted from each of the openings along both racks, and the three had their heads together at the display.

“Something smells lovely,” she said.

They turned. Gara always had a wide, welcoming smile. She wore a lovely red tunic, with a matching scarf over her hair, and she smiled. “It’s the marob root,” she said. “The leaves are quite aromatic.”

They’d recently gotten the root from the Numiri. Taitt couldn’t quite remember, but she was almost certain it was going to be used to make tea.

Ensign Bronowski glanced at Taitt, then back at the display, clearly startled. “Is it that time already?”

“I’m a little early,” Taitt admitted. “But I take it you’ve all been burning the midnight oil?”

“I’m sorry?” Gara said.

“It’s a human expression,” Cir said, surprising Taitt. “It means working late.”

They all looked at him. The large Ocampa shrugged. “Something Captain Cavit said about ‘gift horses’ made me curious. I’ve been reading about linguistics. Humanity has an amazing variance of language for a single species.”

“We were thinking of trying to cross-breed the marob with ginger,” Bronowski said. “I didn’t realize how long we’d been at it.”

“We all tend to over-focus when we find a challenge,” Gara said, offering a similar smile to Bornowski.

Taitt watched a heated flush rise up Bronowski’s neck. Someone was developing a crush. She tried to imagine Doug Bronowski and Gara paired up and couldn’t quite do it: Bronowski was an efficient officer and a pleasant enough man, but he had no sense of humour and very little to say most of the time. Gara was a social woman.

Then again, opposites attract, and all that.

“How many racks do we have going in hydroponics now?” she said, putting herself back on track, and nodding at the tray they were working with.

“All of them should be full by the end of the week,” Bronowski said. “And I can’t take most of the credit. While I’ve been flying the ship, these two have increased our yields by nearly half.”

“I like to grow,” Cir said with a little shrug.

“And Eru’s always asking for new flavours,” Gara said.

“Well, we all love you for it,” Taitt said, and she wasn’t overstating. Eru had more-or-less taken complete control over the kitchen in the Mess Hall, though Gara often spent some time there during the night shift. What Eru had managed to accomplish with the fruit and vegetables they were growing in their Airponics and Hydroponics gardens had started as a necessary way to avoid dipping into their food stores and replicator use, but now the crew looked forward to seeing what flavourful foods were on hand every day.

“I’m on the conn again for the next three days,” Bronowski said. “But I’ve set up a schedule for these two. No doubt I’ll come back to more than I asked for.”

Taitt nodded. “Thank you.” He might not have a sense of humour, but Doug Bronowski was definitely not one to take credit where it wasn’t due. “I’ll catch up with you two tomorrow then,” she said, and left them to their work.

*

By the time Taitt got to Stellar Cartography, she was humming a happy tune to herself. Sometimes, the morning lab walk left her feeling overwhelmed. When she’d been given the Senior Science Officer position, she’d been fully aware that Captain Janeway had a science background far superior to her own, and the Captain herself had told her during their initial discussions that she fully intended to be a mentor as well as her commanding officer.

Instead, Taitt lost many officers and found herself without that mentor at all.

But today? Today was a good day.

Stellar Cartography was one of the labs most often working around the clock. Given they were in unexplored space and heading

To one side, clearly working on long-rage sensors and crafting astrogation charts, Ensign Jenkins looked up long enough to offer a simple smile-and-nod to Taitt as she entered, which Taitt returned.

At the centre of the lab, however, three people sat around the main display—Ensign Hickman, Crewman Telfer, and Abol, the Ocampa who spent most of his time here since he’d discovered his love for the stars—and all three didn’t so much as glance her way.

Clearly, something interesting was happening. Usually she got something from them, and if she was being honest with herself (as she was, since this was a good day), not having Abol aim his handsome face in her direction was something of a letdown.

She could never admit that to anyone else, of course.

“Good morning,” she said, announcing herself with some amusement.

“Oh! Lieutenant,” Ensign Hickman said, rising. She’d done her hair back in a brighter shade of red again, and it made Taitt feel good to see it. She’d had her hair like that when they’d first met on the Bridge nearly two months ago, but hadn’t done so again after the explosion in this very lab since. It was nice to see.

“Good morning,” Abol said. There was that handsome face. She allowed herself exactly one second to bask.

“We found something interesting,” Crewman Telfer said. His voice was a little dry, and he cleared his throat, not looking up from the display.

“Were you here all night?” Taitt said, raising an eyebrow at the young man. It occurred to her he’d worked the day shift yesterday. He should have been gone hours ago. He looked up at her, and the dark smudges under his eyes said more than enough.

“I wanted to see it through?” he said, his voice rising on the last word and turning it into something of a question, like he knew full well he shouldn’t still be there.

“Bill,” she said. “We talked about this.” She eyed Hickman, too. The ensign should have sent him on his way, no matter how enthusiastic he’d been about whatever they’d discovered.

“We found signs of a potential spatial opening,” Telfer said.

Taitt turned back to their display, all thoughts of gentle rebuke gone. “Show me.”

Telfer worked he station, and above the table, a ringed planet appeared. A moment later, superimposed over the image, a series of readings appeared like drops of rain, mostly around the rings, though some further from the planet.

“At first we thought it might be a wormhole,” Hickman said. “But it’s not one spatial anomaly. It’s many. And they’re mostly concentrated in the larger asteroids among the rings of this planet, though sometimes they’re as much as a hundred thousand kilometres away from the planet itself.”

Taitt nodded, watching the readings as they appeared.

“We couldn’t locate a counter-signature,” Abol said. “So wherever these spatial openings lead to, it’s not within range of Voyager’s long-range sensors.”

Taitt watched the readings a few seconds more. “Vacuoles.”

“That’s what we think,” Telfer said.

Taitt smiled, straightening. “Good work.” She turned to Hickman. “Send me everything you’ve got on this. I’ll bring it to the Captain.”

The three beamed at her. She allowed herself another second to be on the receiving end of Abol’s dark brown eyes and his smile, then turned her attention back to Telfer.

“And Bill?”

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

“Go to bed.”

“Yes, Lieutenant.”

Taitt left them in the lab, humming again.

Definitely a good day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As in previous retellings, I'm going to try to take a different angle on the same theme/location as the Canon episode. I hope you enjoy!


End file.
